Is Sjogren's syndrome serious?

summary

Sjogren's syndrome (SS) is a chronic autoimmune disease that invades exocrine glands, especially salivary and lacrimal glands. The main manifestations are dry mouth and eyes, and multiple organ and system damage. A large number of lymphocytes infiltrated into the affected organs and a variety of autoantibodies were positive in serum. This syndrome is also called autoimmune exocrine gland disease, Sjogren's syndrome and xerophthalmic arthritis syndrome. It often overlaps with other rheumatic diseases or autoimmune diseases. Next, I'll tell you something.

Is Sjogren's syndrome serious?

Dry angle, conjunctivitis patients often have intraocular foreign body sensation, burning sensation, itching, dry eyes. In the early stage, there are often too many tears. With the development of the disease, the vision is gradually blurred, the eyes are red, and the eyes are painful. It is difficult to open the eyes when you get up in the morning. In the future, when the foreign body is stimulated or the emotion is excited, the tears can not be produced.

In the early stage of xerostomia, patients often feel lack of saliva, dry mouth or sticky mouth, followed by lack of saliva when eating. Taste loss, tongue and mouth corner fragmentation, pain, chewing and swallowing difficulties. It can wake up at night due to dry mouth. Due to the patient's dry mouth and drinking too much, can be similar to diabetes insipidus. Food adheres to the dry oral mucosa, which can cause oral mucosa peeling and oral bleeding, and sometimes Candida albicans infection. Due to the decrease of saliva, dental caries is easy to occur.

Parotid gland enlargement less than 1 / 3 of the patients can appear parotid gland enlargement, most patients feel local mild discomfort. The parotid gland is hard and has no tenderness, but it may have tenderness in secondary infection. The majority of parotid gland enlargement is simple dry mouth and eyes. Parotid angiography showed that almost all of them had segmental dilatation or stenosis of parotid duct. Parotid gland enlargement may be caused by calcification or secondary infection, which is easy to be misdiagnosed as parotitis.

matters needing attention

The disease is a systemic disease, which can involve various organs and systems. The clinical manifestations are diverse, and the onset is hidden, the progress is slow, and it is not easy to diagnose early. For middle-aged women, if there are rampant teeth, repeated parotid gland enlargement, recurrent suppurative infection of eyelids, purulent secretion of canthus, non infectious organ damage, unexplained renal tubular acidosis, chronic pancreatitis, Hypergammaglobulinemia should be highly suspected. Autoantibody examination, eye and oral examination are helpful for early diagnosis.